Norman Foster, "so British" king of architecture

At almost 88 years old, Norman Foster - or rather Lord Foster after being knighted a peer of the kingdom by the Queen in 1999 - is the story of the perfect success of a young Englishman, son of an accountant and a cashier mother, modest family of Reddish, in the working-class suburbs of Manchester. Starting from nothing - he left school at 16 and does odd jobs to finance his studies, after a military service in the Royal Air Force where his passion for aeronautics matured - the Yale graduate, a scholarship in his pocket for the United States, was able to provoke the chance of his meteoric rise. "There, I discovered myself and met Richard Rogers with whom I founded, back in England, my firm Team 4, with our wives, Wendy Foster and Su Rogers. The adventure lasted five years, until 1967. It will continue with a short collaboration with Renzo Piano, before setting up Foster Associates, renamed Foster + Partners. The beginnings of the success of a war machine...

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